The articles of clothing or leather and the fashion accessories are often enhanced by decorative elements reproducing trademarks, logos, scripts and/or images.
In the fashion field, and also in other fields, there is a widespread technique of fixing to the article of clothing or, generally, to the fabric or skin, strings of alphanumeric characters representing words, trademarks, logos or more generally alphanumeric codes.
More and more often, such decorations are getting fundamental elements for identifying an enterprise or a determined product. Consequently they are taking a relevant importance.
Due to their commercial importance, such decorative elements were progressively improved over time, to the extent that they have taken now particularly elegant and renowned configurations.
Specifically, besides the traditional printed customizations, embossed decorations formed by single metal inserts, which are suitably applied to a product to be characterized, were devised.
These alphanumeric codes typically consist of a set of letters, numbers and symbols made, according to the requirements, of metal and/or plastic material, and can be fixed to a fabric by several known methods.
If a string is formed by a single stiff piece, these known methods can include fixing the whole string on the fabric by a single operation by means of known techniques such as, for example, by punching or riveting. First, an inconvenience of this assembly method is the local loss of resilience and flexibility in the fabric where the string is fixed because the string is a stiff element, certainly less flexible than the fabric on which the string is applied.
An alternative to this mounting method consists of fixing individually the characters if the string is not made in a single piece in order to make the characters independent from each other.
Therefore, both the flexibility and resilience of the fabric remain substantially unaltered.
Unfortunately, this latter solution has some inconveniences, among them, long mounting times because the characters are individually fixed on the fabric and the consequent possibility of misalignments among the characters.
In a further alternative, a widespread method entails the engagement of an insert including several characters, obtained by a single micro-melt. Then, after fixing them on a fabric/skin, the runners and feeds are eliminated. The described system does not enable complete elimination of the burrs and process residuals which, consequently, leads to a substantial degradation of the aesthetic value of the insert.
In order to eliminate or at least reduce the above briefly cited inconveniences, the inventor in the past has developed a system for simultaneously applying the inserts according to what is disclosed in the Italian patent No. IT0001399834. This technique provides a single support removably bearing the string of inserts to be applied to the fabric. The single support has a plurality of seats each counter-shaped to the single insert to be applied. In this way, the single support enables maintaining an accurate alignment of the alphanumeric string during the application step. Once the inserts are constrained, the support itself is removed and then discarded. In this way, a customized product is obtained wherein each insert is accurately aligned and finished, and simultaneously separated from the others.
European patent EP2434471 discloses a similar technique by which it is possible to apply a plurality of separated inserts to a support.
The described current techniques, which are nowadays coming onto the market, also in the haute couture/luxury accessories markets, are however further improvable, particularly with reference to the customization aspect.
Actually, the idea of a support bearing the inserts enables accurately aligning the characters and optimally positioning the same without defects of any type. Unfortunately it restricts the customization of a product, because it requires a user to decide beforehand what string must be applied and then the support reproducing this latter.
This entails, on one side, the requirement of applying the string itself on many products for reducing the costs of this technology, and on the other side, the impossibility of customizing the finished product after its sale. This de facto restricts a customer's freedom to decide which characters/strings to apply, for example, when he/she is buying the product.